Archive for June, 2010
admin on June 21st, 2010
The Association for Healthcare Documentation Integrity (AHDI) and The Medical Transcription Industry Association (MTIA) have combined to create the Manual of Ethical Best Practices for the Healthcare Documentation Sector.
The manual will help health care documentation and medical transcription businesses and professionals to adopt policies and procedures for complying with HIPAA privacy and security laws and operating in a manner consistent with best ethical practices related to transcription billing, compensation, and outsourcing. The manual is part of the associations’ ongoing commitment to safeguarding protected health information and upholding the integrity of the profession and industry.
“With the emerging demand from healthcare delivery for increased standardization and greater specificity around exchange of health information, the time is ripe for the healthcare documentation sector to look closely at its compliance practices to ensure that the sector is best positioned to respond to the future needs of health care,” stated AHDI/MTIA CEO Peter Preziosi, PhD, CAE. “We want to be a resource for business owners and healthcare documentation professionals in developing policies, procedures, and contracts that reflect high-integrity business practices and promote transparency around key issues that reflect well on the industry as a whole.”
The associations convened an advisory council composed of industry content and practice experts including transcription professionals, managers, quality assurance coordinators, educators, and medical transcription service owners and executives to provide input regarding areas that could benefit from the creation of ethical best practices and to assist in content development for the manual. Council participants recognize that a set of ethical best practices is a necessity at this time of greater regulation, scrutiny, and enforcement by the federal government.
“The medical transcription/healthcare documentation industry is entering a new age of regulation with the increased emphasis on data privacy and security by consumers, the healthcare industry and the government combined with the trend towards increased governmental scrutiny of healthcare vendors,” added Scott Edelstein, Esq., a partner in the health law practice of Squire, Sanders & Dempsey LLP.
Source: http://health-information.advanceweb.com/News/Industry-Buzz/AHDI-MTIA-Combine-to-Create-Compliance-and-Transparency-Manual.aspx
admin on June 15th, 2010
MTIA (Medical Transcription Industry Association) along with AHIMA (American Health Information Management Association) recommends a standard unit of measure for medical transcription of patient medical records. It recommends the visible black character (VBC) measurement standard to be the best document counting method. What was the purpose of having such a standard?
The final goal was to implement a standard for content measurement that the health information management (HIM) practitioners can use to evaluate in-house transcription staff and external transcription service suppliers. The earlier 65-character line standard (also called as the AAMT line) had previously been a standard industry wide unit of measure for content measurement that includes space bar, shift key, bold, underscore, and other keystrokes. With this system the cost for the line/character goes beyond just labor as the cost of the technology is bundled along with domain knowledge and human resources. Thus it became mandatory to develop/choose the best possible Industry standard. The benefits of having such a standard include ease in maintaining service level agreements, better business relationships and having a better tool for evaluation.
According to The MTIA /AHIMA task force among all the different counting methods like ASCII line, the 65-character line, gross line, gross page, per minute pricing, and visible black character (VBC) measurement standards, VBC is the only counting method that can be easily understood, verified, and replicated by all parties in the medical transcription business processes.
Whenever a transcription document is reviewed for quality what are the principles that establish the quality of the documents?
The transcribed report should be reviewed against the actual dictation. Reading the report without listening to the dictation does not provide an accurate comparison of the transcription to the dictation.
The review should apply industry-specific standards as provided by current resources and references. When evaluating style, punctuation, or grammar, The AAMT Book of Style is the industry standard.
The review should encompass attention to risk management issues and the documentation standards of accreditation and healthcare compliance agencies.
Accuracy scores (ratings) should be quantified with the use of a numeric calculation that weights varying degrees of error against the length of the report. AAMT recommends the following quality goals: 100% accuracy with respect to critical errors; 98% accuracy with respect to major errors; and 98% accuracy with respect to all errors in the report, including minor errors (see below for definitions of “critical,” “major,” and “minor” errors).
The reviewer (or the review process) should provide timely and consistent feedback to the medical transcriptionist in order to eliminate repetition of errors.
All measurements, standards, and benchmarks should be disclosed to the medical transcriptionist and should be set forth in written guidelines by the healthcare provider or transcription service.
Source:http://maryanngarth.easyworldwidemall.com/2010/06/02/medical-transcription-standard/
admin on June 8th, 2010
The medical transcription industry has been evolving for years and is today a respectable profession that pays well and professional medical transcriptionists (MT) get all the required support from various medical transcription industry organizations. With the rapid growth expected for the entire health care sector there has been a spurt in the growth of transcription companies at all levels world wide. In the US on March 7, 2006, the Medical transcription occupation became eligible for the U.S. Department of Labor Apprenticeship.
The Association for Healthcare Documentation Integrity (AHDI) was formerly known by the name of the American Association for Medical Transcription (AAMT) and was established in the year 1978. It was formed to obtain recognition and contribute towards patient safety and more accurate medical records. The AHDI is an organization that the MTs join for validation and protection. The association also offers many resources that are of use to those in the MT industry and it takes pride in following the latest and modern trends. What are the types of services offered by AHDI? Well the primary services are concerned with,
Giving of advice
Networking
Job opportunities
Today, advances in digital technology has made it possible for many medical transcriptionists to work more efficiently and comfortably even from the privacy of their homes.
One other organization that promotes the MT industry is the Medical Transcription Industry Association (MTIA). MTIA is a non-profit trade association that represents the companies, vendors, and health professionals. Working alongside AHDI, the association has greatly helped to improve the medical transcription industry and maintain health records world wide. MTIA services include,
Access to thousands of vendor suppliers through a transcription service finder
Sponsors events and conferences annually
Networking through its website.
Provides cutting edge technology know-how to MTs
Source: http://maryanngarth.easyworldwidemall.com/2010/05/29/the-medical-transcription-industry-organizations/
admin on June 1st, 2010
By, Lea M. Sims
With our nation engaged in dialogue around health care reform, and health care delivery engaged in discussions around what “meaningful use” of EHRs will look like, there has never been a more important time for the health care documentation sector to stand up and demonstrate its contributory value to these critical issues. This means aligning our key messages with health care’s goals and demonstrating why we matter to the health data capture process, both now and in the evolving EHR.
What is health care delivery telling us?
More than anything, health care needs cost-effective, technology-centric solutions that ensure quality of care, eliminate redundancy and inefficiency, and improve the quality and accessibility of patient information within and between health care enterprises. When it comes to our sector, the health care system is looking for the right solutions to securely and accurately capture, consume and repurpose health information. It needs partners and advocates who will advance its EHR adoption goals, facilitate reliable data exchange, and deliver robust health encounter information that allows providers to make real-time clinical decisions. And out of the evolving debate around “meaningful use,” a new concern is also emerging-How much of the EHR documentation burden should be shouldered by the physician?
How can our sector respond to those challenges?
The Association for Healthcare Documentation Integrity (AHDI) and the Medical Transcription Industry Association have been delivering a core message to legislators, policymakers and health care stakeholders around the ability of the health care documentation sector to meet these evolving needs for managing health information. Our key messages around EHR adoption have focused on the following points:
1. Preservation of narrative capture is critical to meaningful use of EHRs because:
- More than 1.2 billion clinical records are produced in the U.S. every year.
- 60 percent of all clinical records are documented via traditional dictation/transcription.
- No documentation method captures complex patient stories better than narrative dictation.
- Dictation/transcription is still the preferred method among U.S. physicians for documenting patient encounters.
- Point-and-click templates cannot adequately capture a comprehensive, complete patient story.
- Physician-driven data entry is costing health care time and money; physicians are better deployed in frontline care than burdened with clerical capture.
2. Health care documentation specialists are critical to effective capture of health information because we:
- Understand the diagnostic process and the complex story-telling of patient care.
- Provide risk management support and oversight to ensure health encounters are captured accurately.
- Are able to indentify error/inconsistency in the record as well as support pay-for-performance goals through documentation improvement measures.
- Know how to apply data capture standards that ensure health information is available at point of care for clinical decision-making.
- Integrate seamlessly with data capture technologies, such as EHRs and speech recognition technology (SRT) solutions.
- Partner with physicians to document care encounters in a way that frees up providers for hands-on patient care.
How can you promote this campaign in 2010?
Be an advocate. First and foremost, our sector needs you to promote the concepts above to your providers, clients, health care facilities and legislators. Be proactive in advocating for your current and future value in advancing health care’s goals for EHR adoption. Download the MT Week flyer/poster-Capturing America’s Healthcare Story: Why We Matter to Health Care-at www.ahdionline.org and share it with your professional contacts.
Be ready to deliver. The value proposition we’re making to health care is predicated on the assumption that our workforce can facilitate EHR adoption by being an extra set of eyes on the health record, well-oriented to the diagnostic process, and capable of recognizing error and inconsistency in health information. This will require MTs to embrace professional development, continuing education and credentialing. Position yourself well for evolving and future roles by seeking additional training in new roles/technologies (receive $100 off the cost of our SRT training course if you register in the months of April/May for May/June courses), obtaining your certified medical transcription (CMT) or registered medical transcription (RMT) credential, becoming an AHDI member to stay in the stream of cutting-edge information, and embracing long-term continuing education.
Above article publish on http://health-information.advanceweb.com/Columns/AHDI-Track/Why-We-Matter-to-Health-Care.aspx
